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An ancient princess is awakened from her crypt beneath the desert, bringing with her malevolence grown over millennia, and terrors that defy human comprehension.

Why should you (NOT) watch it?

First of all, this was supposed to be a movie about a mummy. Kind of the one we had back in 1999 (a masterpiece by the way), but sadly we find ourselves in front of the new mission impossible movie. Where the main star is Tom and the rest of things are mere decorations.

This movie faces a big issue: its plot. As per the promotions we saw, it kind of looked like the story was going to be like in the 00s movies. They find a mummy. The mummy awakes. And hell hath no fury. But what happens here is: They find a mummy. The mummy awakes. And then we no longer now if we are in a story of Egyptian mummies or about Black Lagoon Things. The characters are not well-developed. They are flat characters that no one will feel connected at all and they don’t seem to move forward through the film. Plus the story also moves too fast; there isn’t any deep story or anything interesting for the audience, just plain action and silly dialogues.

The story looked promising at first. At least for the first 5 min until the appearance of the female character. No I am not talking about the mummy but about a kind of Lara Croft that suddenly appears and never leaves and who, by the way, is playing the though one but is just a useless damsel in distress. So we could have managed without her in here. Then there is a big problem: Tom Cruise’s character. It looked like they wanted to make a modern Rick O’Connell version but it became agent Ethan Hunt and remember, this is not a Mission Impossible movie, but a mummy one!!!

The whole action and whole story is focused on him and at some point we really don’t care at all about him. We just want to see the badass mummy in action. Sadly, the best performance of the movie, that would be the mummy from the tittle, almost doesn’t happen. We get to see a bit of her and a bit of action, or shall I say more horror than action, as they wanted to recover the spirit of the original movie. But it wasn’t enough. This is just a way to create a character and kill it before it even was born. Really a pity. They also introduce Dr Jekyll’s character preparing it for future movies of this “Dark Universe” as they call it, but it doesn’t look like we will be much interested at him in the future.

The only good thing about The Mummy is the mummy herself. If you watch the trailer below you will already now what happens through most the movie, so don’t waste your time nor your money.

#MummyShit

Did you know?

– This film is intended to be the first installment in a possible Universal Monsters shared universe, also known as “Dark Universe.”

– The zero gravity scene took sixty-four takes and was shot for two days in a falling plane. Reportedly, a lot of the crew got nauseous during the scene and vomited, except for the main stars, Tom Cruise and Annabelle Wallis, who were really proud of the stunt.

– The Mummy’s design and gender were altered due to Apocalypse’s look during the post-credit scene in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014).

– The film’s tagline, “Welcome to a new world of gods and monsters,” is a quote from Bride of Frankenstein (1935), which was also produced by Universal.

– The film’s original plot was set in Iraq and followed a Navy SEAL and his team that battle mummies led by Ashurbanipal.

– At the fight in Dr. Jekylls office a big golden book falls out of one of the book cupboards. Clearly a link or reference to the “Golden Book of Amun-Ra” which was significant to the plot of the 1999 Mummy movie.

– The movie introduces Russell Crowe as Dr. Jekyll, which will set up the character for a standalone film in Universal’s monster universe.

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“The dead have taken command of the sea. They’re searching for a girl, a Pearl, and a Sparrow!”

What is this movie about?

A boy and a girl cross paths and with the help of Captain Jack Sparrow go in a quest to find the trident of Poseidon.

Why should you watch it?

First of all, you can forget the previous film. As it never existed, but keep in mind the first trilogy, as this movie is kind of soft reboot of that one and we might see some familiar faces on it, and also some similar situations by the way.

As we are used to in all Pirates of the Caribbean movies, the action never stops. With long action scenes that never seem to end, with all details under control and crossing paths with all the characters, this movie is a good way to entertain ourselves and feel melancholic about the first (and movie) of all of them. In here different paths find their way to the same solution: they needs to find the trident of Poseidon for different reasons, and that makes all different characters having to work together. Does that sound familiar?

Johnny Depp plays again Captain Jack Sparrow and while he makes us laugh sometimes, we are already used to his performance so it feels like there is nothing new in there, specially after five movies of the same. As the new comers are the youngsters who display a good chemistry trough all the movie and that gives a bit of fresh air although we cannot help ourselves to think about Orlando and Keira in the previous installments. Then we have a new villain Captain Salazar played by Javier Bardem who gives great and sometimes funny performance, specially when he goes like: “Spaaarrrow””, Sparroww”, that I cannot help myself but think of Robert De Niro in Cape Fear.

A good adventures movies that recovers the spirit of the first movies of the saga and keeps up with the humor that is also always present in these movies. Plus stay tuned for the post-credit scenes, a fan service scene that leaves doors open…

Did you know?

– The name of the fifth installment, “Dead Men Tell No Tales,” was previously mentioned by Cotton’s parrot in the first movie, The Curse of the Black Pearl, and during a transition scene in the third movie, At World’s End.

– In several countries, the film is set to be released as Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar’s Revenge, including English-speaking countries.

– With a release six years after its predecessor, marks the largest gap between the Pirates of the Caribbean films.

– At two hours and nine minutes long, this has the shortest running time of all the “Pirates of the Caribbean” films.

– The first film of the franchise to not be filmed in the Caribbean.

– Christoph Waltz was originally cast in the role of Captain Brand, but dropped out due to other work commitments. Javier Bardem was then given the role, but the name was changed from Brand to Salazar to sound more Mediterranean to accompany Bardem’s Spanish descent.

– After failing to return for Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011), Disney reached back out to Martin Klebba (Marty), Lee Arenberg (Pintel) and Mackenzie Crook (Raghetti) to return for Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017). Only Klebba was able to make it work within his schedule.

– The father of Captain Jack Sparrow was played by a Rolling Stone (Keith Richards) and in this film, the uncle of Captain Jack Sparrow is played by a Beatle (Paul McCartney).

– The Jack Sparrow’s uncle tells Jack a joke : the same joke told by Al Pacino to Johnny Depp during ” Donnie Brasco ” shooting . ” A skeleton walks into a bar , orders a mop and a beer … ”

– The five finalists for the female lead were Lucy Boynton, Gabriella Wilde, Jenna Thiam, Kaya Scodelario, and Alexandra Dowling. After Brenton Thwaites was cast, the studio did chemistry tests with Thwaites and the actresses to see who best fit the role. Kaya Scodelario was eventually cast. (Variety)

The crew of a colony ship, bound for a remote planet, discover an uncharted paradise with a threat beyond their imagination, and must attempt a harrowing escape.

Why should you watch it?

It’s the first time that we get to see a proper Alien in an Alien movie for 20 years. So curiosity, after watching the trailer, had us attracted to watch this movie; and also the need to get the unsolved questions raised in Prometheus.

The action takes place 10 years after the previous movies and where we see the magic equation from the old alien movies: a crew going somewhere and receiving an alert message, so they go to that planet to investigate and they find there one or two surprises. While this might have worked in the first two alien movies (and masterpieces), here there is something missing. The story goes too fast and there isn’t any surprises at all, because while we are watching the movie, we are guessing what is going to happen. And that is really a pity.

We do indeed get many answers, but maybe they are not what we were expecting (not what we wanted) and the feeling that you have been waiting almost 40 years for this, gives you a strange feeling. Plus, the movie leaves many open doors and raises other kind of questions that we hope will be patched up in the following movie, which by the way you will be left wondering what is going to happen: how they are going to connect this one to the original one.

Another problem that I see is that there are too many actors, there are like 15 crew members, which we see suffering one after another. And believe me when I say this is the first Alien movie were I laughed at the fate of some of them, because some situations are a bit ridiculous, pardon me. Maybe with fewer people the repeating idea would have worked differently adn even better. Despite that at some point we hear the Alien and the Prometheus theme, we are left a bit cold or feeling nothing like we felt 40 years ago.

Although the film shines more light to the Alien story than Prometheus did, it feels like something is missing, which is ironical as it provides many answers, which we have been waiting for since the original Alien movie. It feels just like another action movie, missing the magic of the two original ones (please pretend that Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection never existed).

Did you know?

– A Covenant is an agreement or a promise. In biblical terms, one of the Covenants between God and humanity was a promise by God to never again wipe clean the Earth as he has done in the flood. Another was the giving of the law to Moses. It was an agreement that the Israelites would follow God’s commandments, and God would justly judge those who broke them. It is possible that the “covenant” in this title refers to an agreement between the Engineers and humanity, or perhaps that the Engineers have been or planned to wipe out other species via a “flood” of their own creation.

– The name ‘Alien: Paradise Lost’ was used to avoid confusion that surmounted due to dissociation with ‘Prometheus’ from the ‘Alien’ franchise. The film was later retitled to ‘Alien: Covenant.’

– The new planet, which is assumed to be the home of the engineers, is being referred to as a paradise and could be the home of the gods who created humanity.

– On November 27, 2015, Ridley Scott announced that this will be the second (following Prometheus (2012)) in a new Alien Trilogy which will take place closer to and lead up to the original film.

– First Alien film to be released after the death of H R Giger. Giger inadvertently designed the original Alien looks and environments in his “Necronomicon” book, which led to Ridley Scott hiring him as art director for the film (and series). Giger essentially gave birth to the entire Alien look that we all know now.

– At one stage, Katherine Waterston’s character Daniels says “I got you, you son of a bitch.” Ellen Ripley uses these words at the end of the original Alien film.

– There is a scene where you can see a toy bird drinking water, in the original Alien (1979) in the opening scene there is a toy bird drinking water in the background.